with some of those questions that figure most prominently in the press and in some of the letters which reach a President's desk.

Many Americans are confused by the barrage of information about military engagements. They long for the capsule summary which has kept tabs on our previous wars, a line on the map that divides friend from foe.

Precisely what, they ask, is our military situation, and what are the prospects of victory?

The first answer is that Vietnam is aggression in a new guise, as far removed from trench warfare as the rifle from the longbow. This is a war of infiltration, of subversion, of ambush. Pitched battles are very rare, and even more rarely are they decisive.

I

Today, more than 1 million men from the Republic of Vietnam and its six allies are engaged in the order of battle.

Despite continuing increases in North Vietnam infiltration, this strengthening of allied forces in 1966, under the brilliant. leadership of General Westmoreland, was instrumental in reversing the whole course of this war.

-We estimate that 55,000 North Vietnamese and Vietcong were killed in 1966, compared with 35,000 the previous year. Many more were wounded, and more than 20,000 defected.

-By contrast, 9,500 South Vietnamese, more than 5,000 Americans, and 600 from other allied forces were killed in action.

-The Vietnamese Army achieved a 1966

average of two weapons captured from the Vietcong to every one lost, a dramatic turn around from the previous 2 years.

-Allied forces have made several successsweeps through territories that were

ful

formerly considered Vietcong sanctuaries only a short time ago. These operations not only cost the enemy large numbers of men and weapons, but are

very damaging to his morale.

Well, what does all of this mean? Will the North Vietnamese change their tactics? Will there be less infiltration of main units? Will there be more of guerrilla warfare?

The actual truth is we just don't know. What we do know is that General Westmoreland's strategy is producing results, that our military situation has substantially improved, that our military success has permitted the groundwork to be laid for a pacification program which is the longrun. key to an independent South Vietnam.

Since February 1965, our military operations have included selective bombing of military targets in North Vietnam. Our purposes are three:

-To back our fighting men by denying

the enemy a sanctuary;

-To exact a penalty against North Viet

nam for her flagrant violations of the Geneva accords of 1954 and 1962; -To limit the flow, or to substantially increase the cost of infiltration of men and materiel from North Vietnam. All of our intelligence confirms that we have been successful.

Yet, some of our people object strongly to this aspect of our policy. Must we bomb, many people ask. Does it do any military good? Is it consistent with America's limited objectives? Is it an inhuman act that is aimed at civilians?

On the question of military utility, I can only report the firm belief of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Central Intelligence Agency, General Westmoreland and our commanders in the field, and all the courses of information and advice available to the Commander in Chief and

that is that the bombing is causing serious disruption and is bringing about added burdens to the North Vietnamese infiltration effort.

We know, for example, that half a million people are kept busy just repairing damage to bridges, roads, railroads, and other strategic facilities, and in air and coastal defense and repair of powerplants.

I also want to say categorically that it is not the position of the American Government that the bombing will be decisive in getting Hanoi to abandon aggression. It has, however, created very serious problems for them. The best indication of how substantial is the fact that they are working so hard every day with all their friends throughout the world to try to get us to stop.

The bombing is entirely consistent with America's limited objectives in South Vietnam. The strength of Communist mainforce units in the South is clearly based on their infiltration from the North. So I think it is simply unfair to our American soldiers, sailors, and marines, and our Vietnamese allies to ask them to face increased enemy personnel and firepower without making an effort to try to reduce that infiltration.

Now as to bombing civilians, I would simply say that we are making an effort that is unprecedented in the history of warfare to be sure that we do not. It is our policy to bomb military targets only.

We have never deliberately bombed cities, nor attacked any target with the purpose of inflicting civilian casualties.

We hasten to add, however, that we recognize, and we regret, that some people, even after warning, are living and working in the vicinity of military targets and they have suffered.

We are also too aware that men and machines are not infallible and that some mistakes do occur.

But our record on this account is, in my opinion, highly defensible.

Look for a moment at the record of the other side.

Any civilian casualties that result from our operations are inadvertent, in stark contrast. to the calculated Vietcong policy of systematic terror.

Tens of thousands of innocent Vietnamese civilians have been killed, tortured, and kidnaped by the Vietcong. There is no doubt about the deliberate nature of the Vietcong program. One need only note the frequency with which Vietcong victims are village leaders, teachers, health workers, and others who are trying to carry out constructive programs for their people.

Yet, the deeds of the Vietcong go largely unnoted in the public debate. It is this moral double bookkeeping which makes us get sometimes very weary of our critics.

But there is another question that we should answer: Why don't we stop bombing to make it easier to begin negotiations? The answer is a simple one:

-We stopped for 5 days and 20 hours in May 1965. Representatives of Hanoi simply returned our message in a plain envelope.

-We stopped bombing for 36 days and 15

hours in December 1965 and January 1966. Hanoi only replied: "A political settlement of the Vietnam problem can be envisaged only when the United States Government has accepted the four-point stand of the Government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, has proved this by actual deeds, has stopped unconditionally and for good its air raids and all other acts of war against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam."

-And only last month we stopped bomb

ing for 5 days and 18 hours, after many

prior weeks in which we had communicated to them several possible routes to peace, any one of which America was prepared to take. Their response, as you know, delivered to His Holiness the Pope, was this: The United States "must put an end to their aggression in Vietnam, end unconditionally and definitively the bombing and all other acts of war against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, withdraw from South Vietnam all American and satellite troops, recognize the South Vietnamese National Front for Liberation, and let the Vietnamese people settle themselves their own affairs."

That is where we stand today.

They have three times rejected a bombing pause as a means to open the way to ending the war and going to the negotiating table. The tragedy of South Vietnam is not limited to casualty lists.

There is much tragedy in the story of a nation at war for nearly a generation. It is the story of economic stagnation. It is the story of a generation of young men-the flower of the labor force-pressed into military service by one side or the other.

No one denies that the survival of South Vietnam is heavily dependent upon early economic progress.

My most recent and my most hopeful report of progress in this area came from an old friend of Tennessee, of the Tennessee Valley Authority-David Lilienthal, who recently went as my representative to Vietnam to begin to work with the Vietnamese people on economic planning for that area.

He reported and with some surprise, I might add-that he discovered an extraordinary air of confidence among the farmers, and the village leaders, and the trade unionists, and the industrialists. He concluded that their economic behavior suggests and I quote

him, "that they think that they know how this is all going to come out."

Mr. Lilienthal also said that the South Vietnamese were among the hardest working people that he had seen in developing countries around the world, that "to have been through 20 years of war and still have this amount of ‘zip' almost ensures their longterm economic development."

Mr. Lilienthal will be going with me to Guam Saturday night to talk with our new leaders about the plans that he will try to institute there.

Our AID programs are supporting the drive toward this sound economy.

But none of these economic accomplishments will be decisive by itself. And no economic achievement can substitute for a strong and free political structure.

We cannot build such a structure-because only the Vietnamese can do that.

And I think they are building it. As I am talking to you here, a freely elected Constituent Assembly in Saigon is now wrestling with the last details of a new constitution, one which will bring the Republic of Vietnam to full membership among the democratic nations of the world.

We expect that constitution to be completed this month.

In the midst of war, they have been building for peace and justice. That is a remarkable accomplishment in the annals of mankind.

Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge, who has served us with such great distinction, is coming to the end of his second distinguished tour of duty in Saigon.

To replace him, I am drafting as our Ambassador to the Government of Vietnam, Mr. Ellsworth Bunker-able and devoted, full of wisdom and experience acquired on five continents over many years.

As his Deputy, I am nominating and

recalling from Pakistan, Mr. Eugene Locke, our young and very vigorous Ambassador to Pakistan.

To drive forward with a sense of urgency in our work in pacification, I am sending the President's Special Assistant, Mr. Robert Komer.

To strengthen General Westmoreland in the intense operations that he will be conducting in the months ahead, I am assigning to him additional topflight military personnel, the best that this country has been able to produce.

So you can be confident that in the months ahead we shall have at work in Saigon the ablest, the wisest, the most tenacious, and the most experienced team that the United States of America can mount.

In view of these decisions and in view of the meetings that will take place this weekend, I thought it wise to invite the leaders of South Vietnam to join us in Guam for a part of our discussions, if it were convenient for them. I am gratified to be informed that they have accepted our invitation.

I should also like for you to know that the representatives of all the countries that are contributing troops in Vietnam will be coming to Washington for April 20 and 21 meetings for a general appraisal of the situ ation that exists.

Now this brings me to my final point, the peaceful and just world that we all seek. We have just lived through another flurry of rumors of "peace feelers."

Our years of dealing with this problem have taught us that peace will not come easily.

The problem is a very simple one: It takes two to negotiate at a peace table and Hanoi has just simply refused to consider coming to a peace table.

I don't believe that our own position on

peace negotiations can be stated any more clearly than I have stated it many times in the past or than the distinguished Secretary of State, Mr. Rusk, or Ambassador Goldberg, or any number of other officials have stated it in every forum that we could find.

I do want to repeat to you this afternoon-and through you to the people of America-the essentials now, lest there be any doubts.

-United States representatives are ready

at any time for discussions of the Vietnam problem or any related matter, with any government or governments, if there is any reason to believe that these discussions will in any way seriously advance the cause of peace.

-We are prepared to go more than halfway and to use any avenue possible to encourage such discussions. And we have done that at every opportunity. We believe that the Geneva accords of 1954 and 1962 could serve as the central elements of a peaceful settlement. These accords provide, in essence, that both South and North Vietnam should be free from external interference, while at the same time they would be free independently to determine their positions on the question of reunification.

We also stand ready to advance toward a reduction of hostilities, without prior agreement. The road to peace could go from deeds to discussions, or it could start with discussions and go to deeds.

We are ready to take either route. We are ready to move on both of them.

But reciprocity must be the fundamental principle of any reduction in hostilities. The United States cannot and will not reduce its activities unless and until there is some reduction on the other side. To follow any other rule would be to violate the trust that

we undertake when we ask a man to risk his life for his country.

We will negotiate a reduction of the bombing whenever the Government of North Vietnam is ready and there are almost innumerable avenues of communication by which the Government of North Vietnam can make their readiness known.

To this date and this hour, there has been no sign of that readiness.

Yet, we must-and we will-keep on trying.

As I speak to you today, Secretary Rusk and our representatives throughout the world are on a constant alert. Hundreds and hundreds of quiet diplomatic conversations, free from the glare of front-page headlines, or of klieg lights, are being held and they will be held on the possibilities of bringing peace to Vietnam.

Governor Averell Harriman, with 25 years of experience of troubleshooting on the most difficult international problems that America has ever had, is carrying out my instructions. that every possible lead, however slight it may first appear, from any source, public or private, shall be followed up.

Let me conclude by saying this: I so much wish that it were within my power to assure

that all those in Hanoi could hear one simple message-America is committed to the defense of South Vietnam until an honorable peace can be negotiated.

If this one communication gets through and its rational implications are drawn, we should be at the table tomorrow. It would be none too soon for us. Then hundreds of thousands of Americans-as brave as any who ever took the field for their countrycould come back home.

And the man who could lead them back is the man that you trained and sent from here, our own beloved, brilliant General "Westy" Westmoreland. As these heroes came back to their homes, millions of Vietnamese could begin to make a decent life for themselves and their families without fear of terrorism, without fear of war, or without fear of Communist enslavement.

That is what we are working and what we are fighting for. We must not-we shail not-and we will not-fail.

Thank you.

NOTE: The President spoke at 12:05 p.m. in the House Chamber of the State Capitol at Nashville. In his opening words he referred to Lieutenant Governor Frank C. Gorrell, Speaker James H. Cummings of the State House of Representatives, and Governor Buford Ellington, all of Tennessee.

State Community College.

Governor Ellington, Secretary Gardner, Dr. Clark, Reverend Allen, my dear friend Mrs. Albert Gore, Congressman and Mrs. Anderson, and my friends of Tennessee:

First of all, I learned that Mrs. Johnson was coming here to dedicate this community college in Tennessee, and I just could not resist coming along to congratulate all of you myself and to tell the people of Tennessee

how proud I am of the great advancement that they are making: the great achievements that we see in this State every day, the fine quality of public servants, your Senators, your Governor, your Members of Congress.

Congressman Anderson here is doing a wonderful job; Governor Ellington has been there helping us all through the years; Senator Gore and your delegation that brought